Consequences of The Sneak
by hbdragon88
Summary: The entire Harry Potter world knows Marietta Edgecombe as the tattle-tale who ratted out the Defense Association. Most people think it was out of spite. But was it out of fear? Completed
1. Introduction

Marietta Edgecombe was one of the many people in the Defense Association, an organization designed to actually learn Defense against the Dark Arts, since Professor Umbridge was forcing them to only read up on theory and not to practice. The D.A was chosen as a name because it could also mean Dumbledore's Army, the Ministry's worst fear.  
  
The first meeting was at the Hog's Head, where they all signed up. Subsequent meetings occurred at the Room of Requirement. In the first meeting, Harry Potter walked up to Cho Chang and her friend, Marietta Edgecombe. Chang accidentally set Marietta's sleeve on fire and she was severely disgruntled.  
  
In April, after six months of meetings, there was the final meeting. They were practicing their Patronus Charms, or dementor repelling charms. Dobby the house-elf ran in and told them that Umbridge was coming up to the Room of Requirement. Everyone escaped except for Potter; Malfoy managed to catch him in a Trip Jinx. Instantly, Potter was forced to go up to Dumbledore's office by Umbridge.  
  
Harry would soon see who betrayed them. It was Marietta Edgecombe, who was now horribly disfigured with purple pimples that spelled out "SNEAK." She was too afraid to speak now, after being jinxed when she told Umbridge about the D.A. Minutes after Umbridge started to describe the D.A and produce the parchment with all of the D.A.'s members, Dumbledore casually asked them if they could prove six months' worth of meetings. At this point, Shacklebolt charmed her memory, and she said that there were no meetings.  
  
The result was that Umbridge was angry at Marietta for not being able to expel Harry, while Harry and everyone else was angry that she told on them. The D.A was disbanded at this point, because meetings were impossible to hold now that Umbridge was on her guard. Marietta was sent to the hospital wing. Those in the D.A felt small satisfaction that Madam Pomfrey could not remove the purple pimples from her face, nor make any improvement. This was evidenced on the Hogwarts Express journey coming home. Harry sees Marietta, who now wears a balaclava (like a ski mask; covers her whole face except for her eyes).  
  
In all, there are 12 pages that talk about Marietta Edgecombe, from the Hog's Head meeting to the Hogwarts Express encounter. But those short 12 pages cannot do justice to Marietta's story. Ron is terribly angry at her, ranting about her breaking up the group. Harry feels satisfaction that she is horribly disfigured with the purple pimples. All the D.A members who really wanted to learn defense have been cut off due to Marietta's action.  
  
But what about Marietta's side? What about the fact that she had to wear a balaclava for two months, and she couldn't do anything about it? How she had to deal with the wrath of the D.A, and the wrath of Umbridge? Read Cho's dialogue at the first D.A meeting at the Room of Requirement (395 for the USA edition); she did not want to come. Not only that, Marietta's memory was modified so she didn't remember any of the meetings at all. As a result, any kind of guilt she felt was compounded by the fact she didn't have any memories of it.  
  
I hope you enjoy this short piece of fiction.  
  
hbdragon88 


	2. At Hogwarts

Declaimer: These characters mentioned are NOT mine. They are J.K Rowling's.   
  
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My name is Marietta Edgecombe.  
  
People hate me. I don't know why. My best friend Cho doesn't tell me much anymore. She distrusts me now. I feel the glares and hostilities of others, but I do not know why. But it's the same people. There's Harry Potter and his two cronies. Cho, of course, occasionally gives me the dirty look. And it hurts, because I don't know why.  
  
Cho and I used to be best friends. I giggled and laughed at her jokes, and we bantered and talked for hours. Sometimes, we would whisper to each other long through the night in the dormitories. Now she just shuts the hangings around her bed every night and tells me to go away if I approach her. I sometimes lay down on my bed, tears in my eyes, while I listen to her mutter and accuse in her sleep. Sometimes she mentions me. The hard words she uses moves cut through my soft and fragile soul inside like a knife. Inside my mind, I shriek and writhe and saturate my mind with hate and self-pity.  
  
If I was a blade, I was dulling myself. The sickle, praise and talk and good times, was gone. Dulled one side from my parents telling me not to do anything that would displease Umbridge, and dull on the other from allowing myself to let Cho do whatever both of us wanted.  
  
I feel the anguish and pain inside. I sense the hostility of the others, for no explained reason. I keep my head down. I don't talk anymore. Any time I ask them, "Why are you mad at me?" they just glare. "You know what you did wrong," they say sarcastically. "Go away, we don't want you anymore." I wanted to fight back. I wanted to say, "No! You don't understand! I don't remember!" I open my mouth to find out that whatever words I have evaporate out of my mouth.  
  
My mother never told me to stand up to myself. Simply put, she was God, and I listened and followed whatever she said. I swallowed my own pain, inhibitions, and problems so I wouldn't be weak and be left behind. Now they left me behind, and I was weakly trying to follow along.  
  
Nobody will tell me why, how, where, or when. I try to remember, but I only draw blanks. I remember that awful lady Umbridge shaking me, shouting at me why I was saying "no" to some meeting. I remember a bright light and being forced to the ground, and then being escorted to the hospital wing.  
  
The hospital wing was horrible. I lay there for weeks, with Madam Pomfrey trying out all sorts of remedies that burned my face. If I could have, I would have taken a knife and stabbed myself right then, because those harsh treatments that scorched not only my face, but my soul as well. But alas, she was extremely safe. I had no blade, and I could not get one. So I sunk deeper into my own mind, mentally willing myself to survive, hoping that it would be better when I got out.  
  
Nobody ever asks me about how I suffer. How I suffer the shame and humiliation of not knowing what I did. Nobody told me until I got home, and then it was too late to reconcile with the other students. There's no sympathy for the ugly scars that have mutilated my face, forcing me to wear the balaclava to hide my shame. I obviously tattled on someone, but then couldn't say what it was. I alienated my own friends and alienated the authority – Umbridge. My mother, who pressured me so hard to tell the truth, will now hate me. I took the middle path. I helped but didn't finish it. I made Umbridge angry, and her displeasure will cut through me like a whip. Hate is a strong word. But she has been so strict on me, refusing fun, pressuring me to tell, and she has ruined my life.  
  
I used to cry every day in my own dormitory, watching as my own tears silently fell on to the warm velvet covers of my own bed, and not being able to stop them. The first day I got back, I shut my hangings and turned myself inwards to face the wall, to block out and hide from the other four roommates. Nobody asked how I was feeling...or even talked to me at all...  
  
Instinctively, I touch my face. I do it every day, maybe more than that. I trace out the terrible scars, the fading marks of purple blisters that spell out the word "sneak." The day I got back to my dormitory I donned a balaclava, with my head down in shame. It was past midnight to avoid seeing anyone. I croaked out the password to enter the Ravenclaw common room so I wouldn't be recognized. Inside my room, I twisted and turned in my sleep, worrying about what would happen the next day...  
  
There's a girl. Her name is Eloise Midgen. She thinks she has bad acne, and even tried to curse off her own pimples. But her acne problems pale in comparison to "sneak" carved all over my cheeks and nose. The first day back, I became the laughingstock, the running joke, of the whole class. Eloise even came to me and publicly laughed and insulted me. "I don't need to cover my face!" she beamed triumphantly. I told that bitch to shut up and go away, but the sting of the comment still hurt days afterward.  
  
A week later, I found a Galleon in my special box. My hands shaking, I reached out to touch it, wondering why it was there. All my gold was in my gold bag. I slipped it into my pocket and felt it burn hot one day. I instantly looked at the Galleon, but I saw nothing change. Hours later, I was looking around for my best quill, which I had lost, on Cho's bed and found a Knut on her pillow. I heard her say there was Quidditch practice, but I knew she was lying. She didn't have practice that day. I never felt the Galleon burn hot again. On a later Hogsmeade trip, I spent it at Honeydukes on a bag of Acid Pops.  
  
Those Acid Pops soon became my only source of curiosity. Lying in my bed at night, I would take one out and slowly lick it. I felt the tingling sensation of it burning my tongue. The first few times, I licked too quickly and burned my tongue through. I had to go to Madam Pomfrey, whose eyes furrowed as she stared at me, wondering what I was doing. I betrayed nothing, however, and stubbornly told her I took a Truth or Dare from my friends.  
  
Now I stand and sit by Cho in body form only. I only stand near here. I no longer talk to her. She has been good enough to me to let me stand by her, which I am greatly thankful for. But I no longer live anymore. I only exist. My head is either bowed, I am crying in my own bed, or I am in class, solely focusing and concentrating on doing the incantation, and blocking out the chatter, dirty looks, and everything else.  
  
Bad as Hogwarts may be, I'm terrified at what will happen when I get home...my mother has never been proud of me. In the deepest part of my heart, I know she won't be hugging and comforting me.   
  
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Part 2 coming soon! Please review. 


	3. At Home

**At Home**  
  
I am on the train from Hogwarts going back. Throughout the whole trip, I nod, shake my head, whisper, and cheerily and falsely said hello and goodbye. The purple pimple scars are still there. I cover my face with the balaclava. I had been doing that for the past six months, ever since getting out of the hospital. It was routine now, but covering me still felt humiliating.  
  
With a heavy heart, I walked out of the train station wheeling my trunks. I said goodbye to nobody, because nobody cared about what happened to me anymore. Besides, everyone already had tightly clustered into their own groups. I might be a somebody in a crowd, but a nobody when everyone was within their threads of friendship.  
  
I stopped dead when I saw my angry mother. She was breathing fast and was going red in the face. She took one look at me and started to shriek, her face in an uncontrollable fury, her voice shaking. She painfully wrenched my hand and jerked me away from everyone else, still shouting.  
  
As my dark eyes flittered from person to person getting out and watching the spectacle unfold, none showed any sympathy, alarm, or surprise. Or that they cared what happened to me when my mother got home and was done with me.  
  
Surprise.  
  
Nobody would care. Would you care? The annoying, sniveling, bitch who squealed on the most popular kid, Harry Potter? Betrayed all of her friends in one stroke, wrenched and destroyed those strong bonds? The whiny little bitch who always giggles and hangs around with the most popular girl in the school?  
  
No, you wouldn't. I know you wouldn't. Unless you saw the fear in my eyes after I told, or realized that my motivation was out of fear, not out of vindictive spite or pleasure.  
  
Thank you for being honest.  
  
Once inside the house, she wrenched away from her grip by knocking me to the ground. I was used to her flashes of anger. But in-between those moments of anger came brief moments of happiness. Now there was no happiness and even more anger.  
  
Pity.  
  
With her voice mingled with fury and rage, she told me what happened.  
  
Umbridge had fired her.  
  
Umbridge cited a lack of cooperation on my part in breaking up some group called Dumbledore's Army. She claims that I reported it to her, and then said "no" when she asked me if meetings had gone on for six months. My answer led to my mother's firing and blacklisting. Now my mother is screaming how I brought shame and dishonor to the family, and how she can no longer hold the good job of a Ministry and now has to work at a pub as a dirty and low waitress.  
  
My mum's whole life was in the Department of Magical Transportation. When Umbridge put her on probation for failing to alert her fast enough to catch Sirius Black in the fires last October, she had a breakdown. She now tells me this all of this –her October probation, what happened in April, and the result of the April event. Scathingly, she tells me how I've ruined her whole career and life in the Ministry.  
  
I do not tell her about the Memory Charm. She'll only get madder at me.  
  
Each word falls like a blunt object to my skull. My head swims with pain. Somewhere in my mind, I think, she's really not like this. She's just angry with me – very angry – and then she'll step off of me and make me feel all right. She'll tell me that she loves me and that I'm her one and only star.  
  
But as the shouting continues my paranoia and fear bubbles up and washes all over me. My god, I silently think.  
  
She thinks I really was defiant too, intentionally and purposefully not telling Umbridge the truth. Out of my own accord, out of my own will, I made Umbridge upset. I say nothing. My opinions and feelings are unimportant. Out of all people, I foolishly hoped that my mother would try to understand, but she won't even let me talk. Stupid fucking Marietta, you put your fucking hope into something that would never ever happen.  
  
The towering, screaming, red-faced woman in front of me is not my mother. She's not the person that soothingly told me to have a good year at the Hogwarts Express in September. She is this wretched job-obsessed lady who puts her job over her own daughter. She doesn't like me anymore, I tell myself. As she rages, my eyes become blank and unfocused and I repeat it over and over: She loves her job, not me. She loves her job, not me.  
  
Two hours later, after being yelled at, I get sent up to my room. I feel wet tears, but do not wipe them off. I later hear the clinks of dishes being passed out around the table. I walk downstairs. There is only her own plate and setting on the table. Stiffly, my mother tells me to "get your own plate and settings."  
  
My soft and fragile mind instantly hardens, but on the outside I shake a little. My mother is blind to the drying streaks of tears on my face, the balaclava I wear all day, or the warmness of a simple, "How was your school year?" I simply block out the silence and grab a plate from the cabinet and start reaching for the dishes myself, because I know she won't hand them to me. The dinner is eaten in total silence. But even the silence is unbearable.  
  
Daddy isn't back. He'll never be back. They broke up a long time ago and he hasn't seen me for more than ten years. I used to write him a birthday and father's day card every year. But last year, on the tenth anniversary, my hands were shaking so badly that I closed up the card and never touched in since.  
  
Oh, if anyone knew about my problems at home. But not only would they not understand; they might use it against me. There would be the rumors, poor Marietta who isn't strong and submits to her mother.  
  
My mum doesn't see that I became ostracized and an outcast at Hogwarts. I don't need another person hating me. I need someone to love me and make me feel better.  
  
But she doesn't. By the end of dinner, in my mind, I'm not a good little daughter anymore. I don't deserve a mother; it's my fault that she's so angry and tired and exasperated. Anyway, what kind of daughter would be so cruel to cause her own mother to be fired? Nobody but stupid Marietta Edgecombe. She bitterly and truly hates me for dishonoring the family and losing her job, prestige, and pride. And she's right, and I'm wrong.  
  
I walk up to my room. I curl up in my bed, hatred and tears welling up in my throat; I'm barely able to breathe. At school, I often drifted into nothingness for hours, blocking out everything, but this time I listen and wait. This time, I'm waiting for my mother to come upstairs and get into bed.  
  
I make the decision. It seems so easy, just to make a quick decision now. If I 'd done it, I could have saved two months of agonizing and pain.  
  
At midnight, I quietly edge the door open. I hear her deep breathing and know she's asleep. I silently walk down the stairs. I turn on no lights. My hand runs along the wall and refrigerator, feeling for what I need. I open up the utensils drawer and grab the sharpest, longest utensil I can find.  
  
I stole in the night back up into my room. Moonlight splashes on to my desk and bed as I open up the shutters. My eyes widen as I see the blade, long and devilish. But I do not hesitate. Sitting up in my bed, I take one last look at my room. And on her bed, and in a single instant, unpopular, delusional, and stupid Marietta Edgecombe, who lived the rest of her school year scarred and unpopular, has ended her own life.  
  
Bye.  
  
There will be no note. There will be no established reason why Marietta Edgecombe died. They will all speculate, but nobody will ever know of the hidden, brutal, and silent misery that took place. Because everyone is apathetic to others until something happens. Hindsight is always 20/20. Not until they find out that I killed myself will they realize how much they ostracized and forgot about me.  
  
The warm blood has stained the bed sheets and pillow. My eyes are tearing, but it's a warm and tingling feeling of happiness. It tastes so bitter and sweet at the same time; the first real happiness in months. I sway a little as my vision blurs, but my eyes finally close. My body shudders one last time before lying still for the final time.  
  
Goodbye, life, for I had little use for. May my afterlife be better than my short fifteen years on earth... 


	4. Afterward

**Afterward**  
  
There's a lot of grisly stuff in the story's brief two chapters – depression, loss of friends, feelings of suicide, and suicide. Believe it or not, this happens every day. There are teenagers like Marietta who feel that their situation is so helpless and incurable, they take their own lives. Some of them simply survive for months and months before taking their own lives, like Marietta in my story. Or worse, they suffer and never kill themselves, and live out their lives as an empty shell. They do not live, but merely survive.  
  
So, you ask, what's the point of this story? To show that there are two sides to a story, even if nobody wants to acknowledge it. Most Harry Potter fans probably skimmed over the parts with Marietta in it, and felt angry that she sold out the entire Defense Association and caused Dumbledore to get sacked. Those people feel only cold anger and acid pleasure at Marietta's problems and difficulties. The truth is much grayer than that, but Rowling only briefly touches what could be a very powerful and touching tangent of the Harry Potter world. Unfortunately, considering that Marietta is the antagonist, and not the hero, she only gets a brief but pivotal role in the plot, but not much detail into her motivation and aftermath.  
  
Marietta is a weak-willed person. That fact is something none of the trio (Harry, Ron, and Hermione) or anyone else realizes or notices. Cho even said that Marietta never wanted "to be here but [Cho] made her come with me" (395). Marietta is uncertain what to do, and loses both ways in the struggle. She tells the authority about the D.A, earning the wrath and disrespect of the group. But she cannot confirm the hard fact that the D.A had met for six months because her memory was modified, and earns the wrath of Umbridge and Fudge. Neither of them can expel Harry now because they have no proof. They manage to sack Dumbledore, however, and Marietta earns the wrath of the entire school and the professors. She gets shunned from both arenas – both student and authority.  
  
I may have exaggerated what happened as a result, but Marietta obviously was driven into her own self, criticizing, talking, and insulting who she was inside and what made she did that made her so unpopular. She begins to feast and roast on her own doubts, insecurities, and fears, which is extremely unhealthy. She does this because in the Hogwarts in my story, nobody ever tells her what happens. She is left to simply stew in her own juices. The "sneak" scars only embellish her own shame and desire to die, because they are a visual and damaging sign of betrayal, not only for the D.A (the obvious target) but for her own conscience, which doesn't remember what happened. This leads to her inevitable suicide when she loses all her hope and desire to live.  
  
You don't know someone's private life, or what happens at home or in the dormitory. Simply put the trio (Harry, Ron, and Hermione) and the rest of the D.A thought she was doing it out of spite and vindictive pleasure (because Cho burned Mareitta's sleeve in the first meeting). But her world was far more blurred. At her own home, her mother strongly forbade her "to do anything that might upset Umbridge" (395), which encompasses illegal school organizations (Education Decree Number 24).  
  
The motive was much more fearful than vindictive. She was never 100% certain of what she did. As Cho pointed out, Marietta was forced to come along to the meetings. With this in mind, what makes you think that she was 100% certain she was doing the right thing when she reported the group? She instantly regretted it when she realized the impact (Dumbledore sacked, but 28 students might have been expelled). But she bears the irreparable impact of the pimples and the humiliation of covering her face all the time now; Harry sees her "wearing a balaclava" (865), more than two months after telling on the D.A. But because nobody ever thought into what she experienced at home, or the impact the pimples had on her self-esteem, they simply believe "she got what was coming."  
  
These things happen all the time. I'm about two months shy of my sixteenth birthday, and I feel those same doubts and insecurities. But unlike the Marietta I fictionalized, I grew up in a warm and loving environment, with both parents together. And yet those feelings still persist, even now. But only by talking and going to social groups, I have avoided the last and most desperate thoughts of suicide. The signs are painfully obvious – sudden withdrawal, not talking, scars and other marks – but only if someone notices and acts on them, as the Marietta in my own story concluded that nobody had. For thousands of teens yearly, nobody notices, or takes action.  
  
So what am I saying? Notice, observe, and think. There are thousands of teens like Marietta committing suicide daily because they don't talk to people and feel helpless. They become darker, talk less, bow their heads, and lose passion in life and the desire to live. All they want is someone to talk to. It's not healthy to stew in anyone's own thoughts. Even the smallest gesture of _talking_ and _acknowledging_ them – something that most depressed teenagers desperately want – might save them.  
  
Truth: Most things people do are out of their own fear, not their vindication. Marietta didn't mean to get Cho or anyone else expelled, or to get Dumbledore sacked, but she bore the entire weight of everyone's anger for too long. In my fictional story, she committed suicide because of the guilt and anger. The next time you get angry, mad, and shout at a repressed and shy individual, ponder how they will absorb what you said and how they will react to it. And wonder: what will eventually become of them later because you shouted at them?  
  
hbdragon88  
  
Additional note: I have J.K Rowling to thank considerably for putting enough of Marietta in Order of the Phoenix to make into a side story. If you are interested in knowing when Marietta is referred to, here are some page numbers (USA edition):  
  
Hog's Head meeting – 355, 337, 340, 347; First Meeting (Room of Requirement) – 394-395; Dumbledore's office – 612-622, 625; Cho defends Marietta against Harry – 637; Ron's rant on Marietta – 652; and On the Hogwarts Express – 864 


End file.
